Page 49 of The Unweaver

The intimacy unnerved her. She rambled to fill the charged silence. “So. Now that we have Teddy’s body and know where his spirit is, we just need to break the curse and reunite them. And find his heart, now that I think about it. A heart seems important for true reanimation. D’you think whoever cursed him kept his heart? Vile, twisted bastard. And those humans with their magic-draining bullets? That’ll be a complication.”

Bane gave a noncommittal hum. Shifting, his thigh slid along hers.

“Er, what does this symbol mean?” She touched a shimmering tattoo on his bicep. “And why does the ink… swirl?”

“Visibility hieroglyphic to see shadow-cloaked Umbramancers. It’s Phytomancer-enchanted ink.”

She’d heard of such tattoos. Few risked the potential complications of the plant mage’s ink seeping into their veins and polluting their blood. By the look of it, Bane had risked it a dozen times.

Winding the bandage once more around his shoulder, she touched a tattoo on his upper back. “What about this?”

“Celtic protection rune.”

“Protection against what?”

“A memory demon.”

She gaped at him, dropping the bandages. She fumbled to grab them before they hit the floor, flattening her chest against his bare torso. When she had recovered herself and the bandages, she pulled back and exclaimed, “Demons arereal?”

He hesitated for a long moment. “In their own Realm.”

Her brain stalled. She’d heard fables of demons—dark mages with spirits corrupted by the Profane Arts, wreaking havoc in the Living Realm until they were damned into a demonic prison. But until this moment she’d thought demons were a cautionary tale.

Searching his face, she saw only grim sincerity. “Can you traverse there? The Demon Realm?”

“I try not to.”

“Can they come here?”

“Only if there’s a rift in the veil between our Realms. The Tribunal makes sure that I make sure there isn’t one.” He cut off her next question with one of his own, gesturing to her wrist. “What happened?”

She tensed. Her sleeves had drifted up, revealing the scars. White vines thick with thorns slashed across both wrists. Cursing her lost gloves, she shoved her sleeves down and said nothing.

“Those scars look deep,” he said. “How did you survive?”

I didn’t.

Evading his intent gaze, she tied the bandage with unnecessary force. A matching pain erupted in her shoulder.

“They’re more than scars.” He stared at her with a peculiar intensity. “Aren’t they?”

Her pulse leapt. She stepped back but his good hand wrapped around her waist, gripping her in place.

“I don’t want to talk about it.” She pulled out of his grasp, and he let her go. Putting a much-needed distance between them, she shoved the Portal Key into the door and turned left, holding it open for him.

He didn’t move, searching her features for something he couldn’t seem to find. With a sigh, he polished off the whiskey, stood, and strode to the door. He’d drunk a pint of whiskey in under an hour and it hadn’t sapped an ounce of his sobriety.

“How are you”—she gestured from the empty bottle to his steady posture—“upright?”

“I’m Irish,” he said as if explaining the obvious to a dimwit. He brushed past her into his library and dropped into a wingback chair before the fireplace with a weary exhale. The fire’s glow softened the hard angles of his tense face and bare torso.

Panic from the day had subsided, leaving exhaustion in its wake. Cora sank onto the opposite chair and closed her eyes. The events of the day were projected onto the back of her eyelids. Pressing her palms into her eyes didn’t keep the memories from replaying.

But she had Teddy back. Parts of him.Soon, she told herself.Soon.

Movement drew her attention. The Persian cat had leapt onto Bane’s lap. Kevin trained his wide-set yellow eyes on Cora while he extended and retracted his claws. Bane, slouched in the embrace of his armchair, cracked an eye open as if sensing her gaze.

A tired smile tugged at her lips. “Happy Christmas, Bane.”

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